Electronic equipment found in offices and residential areas are valuable and therefore subject to theft. At present there exists a number of methods to inhibit the theft of electronic equipment. Traditionally, an anti-theft device will override the functioning of the equipment such as disrupting visual output or shutting down power as well as incorporate the use of an audible alarm upon detection of a theft. In many cases, the detection of theft in this manner does not aid in tracing the new location of the stolen equipment or in the identification of the apparent thieves.
In many existing anti-theft method and apparatus, the device itself requires that additional hardware be included to function properly. For example it is common to use added hardware needed to produce an audible alarm. Other devices such as that shown in US patent publication 2002/0108058 A1 to Iwamura, require a network to be present between the device being protected and a server, with this network further requiring a monitoring station to poll the protected devices. In addition, at present, electronic anti-theft devices override a device's operation or display requiring compatible software specific to the equipment being protected to control various functions of the equipment.
It is therefore an object of this invention to mitigate at least one of the above disadvantages in providing anti-theft protection to electronic equipment.